8. Marvin Gaye, “I Want to Come Home for Christmas” (saccharine as fuck but still like open-heart surgery because of Marvin’s voice & phrasing)

7. “Merry Christmas Baby” – the Bawse & the E Street Band, mostly because of the keys/drums/horns of the intro (Bittan/Weinberg/Clemons).

6. Bill Withers, “The Gift of Giving.”

5. Prince, “Another Lonely Christmas”

4. The Pogues & Kirsty MacColl, “Fairytale of New York”

3. Donny Edward Hathaway, “This Christmas”

2. Darlene Love, “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)”

1. Vince Guaraldi, “Linus and Lucy,” obviously

[Close, but nope: Run-DMC, “Christmas in Hollis” due to sheer annoying oversaturation (oddly, however, this does not impact the seeding of “Linus and Lucy”), Joni Mitchell’s “River” which is lovely but loses points for encouraging pouty Caucasian female wallowing, James Brown’s “Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto” (boring), and “Happy Xmas (War is Over)” by John & Yoko/Plastic Ono Band, due to John Lennon’s hypocrital ass singing us a big ol’ guilt-trip let’s-all-do-better song while pretending he’s not a man who consistently physically assaulted the women in his life. HAVE A SEAT, LENNON.]